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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23849650">we’ll (re)write history</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WennyT/pseuds/WennyT'>WennyT</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>all i see is blue in my heart [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Alternate Universe - Space, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Brotp, Cameos, Campy, Crack Treated Seriously, Each Chapter is largely Standalone, Gen, Gift Fic, M/M, OTP Feels, no highbrow literature here</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-02 20:53:28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>6,607</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23849650</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WennyT/pseuds/WennyT</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>It's the future. We're humanoids who will write history. </p><p>Or: Jung Yunho and Shim Changmin are colleagues working in time travel.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jung Yunho &amp; Shim Changmin, Jung Yunho/Shim Changmin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>all i see is blue in my heart [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1481972</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>16</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>281</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Case #0: ver. 0.1 system initiate</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cosmicmacchiato/gifts">Cosmicmacchiato</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>"Did you read the briefing packet?" Is asked point-blank of Changmin one lovely crisp Second-Moon when he steps into the transporter hovering in the courtyard at Headquarters. It is waiting to ferry them to their meeting, and it is too early.</p><p>He nearly doesn't catch the question, because his body hasn't had its daily intake of caffeine yet.</p><p>"What briefing packet," Changmin says reflexively, and blinks unfazed at the glare sent this way. "Whoa. Someone woke up on the wrong side of his sleep capsule today."</p><p>"Not everything is a joke," his partner is working himself into a snit. "R&amp;D said we are being debriefed by the Commissioner himself, so if you're still hung over from your gathering of irresponsible cads last night-"</p><p>"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Changmin holds up a palm and a hand that's still clutching his cosmos piccolo in self-defence. "Calm down, of course I read it, I was just joking, have you ever known me to not read anything that's sent to my holo-watch-"</p><p>His partner sniffs. "You forgot the briefing session the last time you and your bunch of merry men drank together, though."</p><p>"Yeah, and you tore me a new asshole for that, Yunho. Why would I dare to do that again?" Changmin snorts, and takes a long pull of his piccolo. He can feel his brain's rusty gears clanking their way to work, and says so.</p><p>"More like those gears were drowned in a sea of alcohol," his partner Yunho, better known by his professional designation Uknow, snipes through something that can barely be called a smile. There are too many of his teeth showing. "I don't understand why you people insist on indulging in a historical vice like that."</p><p>"Just because you're a lightweight...." Changmin coughs, and raises his hands again in supplication when Yunho steps closer. "I'm joking! You like my jokes, remember? Most of them. You laughed at the one about the baby Flurble and the space maid on our assignment last orbit."</p><p>"Hmm," Yunho says. </p><p>Changmin breathes a sigh of silent relief when his partner seems appeased for now, because he's belatedly leaning forward at last to let the transporter scan at his iris. </p><p>"Good Moon," the A.I. for the transporter greets, her voice all modulated cheeriness. "Captain, Class Humanoid, designation Uknow, of the Interspatial and Temporal Task Force. Impending schedule is t minus nineteen minutes to Commissioner Briefing. Attendance mandatory, for two. A word of caution: temporal buffer is thin."</p><p>"Even Bigeast knows you're late," Yunho says. His smile -of a very loose definition of the word- still hasn't waned. </p><p>"I'm standing right here," Changmin says, and tugs at the elbow of Yunho's space suit, so Yunho knows to shift his weight to the side. It means Changmin can lean over Yunho's shoulder, to shove his open eye at Bigeast's iris scanner.</p><p>"Warrant Officer, Class Humanoid, designation Max, of the Interspatial and Temporal Task Force. Attendance mandatory and noted for the same schedule. Proceed?" Bigeast asks placidly.</p><p>"Proceed," Changmin sighs, and sucks in another mouthful of sweet caffeine whilst hooking his chin over Yunho's shoulder. </p><p>The transporter hums to life, and shoots upwards. Artificial gravity means they barely feel the movement though, and Changmin's allowed to finish his cosmos piccolo in relative peace, since Yunho's subsided into grumbling beneath his breath.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away, Changmin is sixty-eight and one hundred orbits old, when the Academy first introduces him to a second lieutenant who will take care of his twelve-orbit internship as a trooper cadet.</p><p>There are various whistling noises of approvals as everyone crowds around his holo-watch with his announcement noticed beamed up into the air. The onlookers even include the Class Kettloid cadet who does nothing but whistle. “You scored Uknow?”</p><p>“Changmin, can we swap?” </p><p>“Damn it, just because the nerd’s got high scores on his theory exams doesn’t mean he should be given Uknow!” </p><p>“The pairings are randomised, don’t be an idiot.”</p><p>“Uknow is us, he is so us, did you hear about how his training period as an officer cadet was cut short because the Task Force basically said they want him on board full-time?”</p><p>“I’ll show you an idiot, come here-”</p><p>“He keeps cycling through his partners though, I heard they paired him up two orbits ago with three other newly promoted cadets, and it didn’t end well.” </p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>The senior is nothing like what he expects.</p><p>Changmin had thought, from the stories floating around, and the one glimpse he had gotten across the academy cafeteria during Cadet Career Fair week, that the senior, designation Uknow, might perhaps welcome him with a gentle smile and patient lectures. Changmin’s good at listening, and taking notes. </p><p>Perhaps they might get to spar, because Changmin’s getting better at taking fellow cadets out via sonic screams these days. His professors swear there must be some Class Siren in his family history, despite his parents’ collective puzzlement and bemused denials.</p><p>Or perhaps he might even get to use Uknow’s infamous gunlance in a shooting tutorial, designated Cassiopeia after his senior once took out five space bandits, under the light of the constellation Cassiopeia as an officer cadet on an abandoned asteroid moon.</p><p>He gets none of the above. </p><p>Instead his greeting salute is criticised, down to the very angle Changmin tilts his straightened fingers in relation to his cap. Changmin speaks too soft and his sparring moves are too slow to save his life in the field and how can Changmin not understand that sometimes you cannot pause to differentiate friend from foe in the field because <em> they don’t allow you to pause before trying to stab you in the face with a electro-sabre. </em> </p><p>Within the first hour of knowing each other, Changmin is already familiar friends with Uknow’s cold gaze and has been treated to a brisk, “just quit the Academy now, if you’re not prepared to take this seriously.”</p><p>The only thing that hasn’t come under verbal fire is the state of Changmin’s uniform suit, which earned a begrudging “you’re neat, cadet.”</p><p> </p><p>-- </p><p> </p><p>The twelve orbits are almost up, before Changmin manages to not fumble during the smaller missions that Uknow allows him to tag along on, and even saves Uknow’s life on one such mission.</p><p>“I saw him coming,” Uknow says, unsmiling. “The thief, I mean. I knew what he was going to do with the pulse cannon.”</p><p>But when they set his transporter on her course back to Headquarters, Uknow allows Changmin to key in the coordinates instead of performing the task himself, as is his wont.</p><p>It’s accompanied by an almost inaudible, “I guess you can call me Yunho. If you want.”</p><p>Changmin blinks at him, fierce joy a molten pool at the bottom of his stomach. “What did you say, senior?”</p><p>“You heard me,” Uknow- <em> Yunho</em>, it’s Yunho now, says, inscrutable. </p><p>“Yes, I did,” Changmin hurries to affirm. His lips hurt from grinning. He'll prove himself yet. “Yunho.”</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Yunho asks for Changmin to be assigned to him as his full-time Task Force partner barely two moons on, after the cessation of Changmin's internship. </p><p>The Academy approves it, together with Changmin’s accelerated graduation into a proper corporal. Changmin graduates with full honours and top scores, and decides to take the mocking nickname that they had for him in the dorms and shorten it down into his new designation Max. Yunho approves. </p><p>It’s not always fun and games, but they make a good team, the two of them. </p><p>They spend thirty orbits in the General Task Force, racking up an exponentially impressive record of captures and arrests, before transferring as a team to the relatively more elite Interspatial and Temporal Task Force sub-unit. </p><p>Specialising in investigating crimes of a temporal nature, Changmin will come to learn, is a very different ball game all together.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Two hundred orbits and numerous assignments together later, Yunho looks at him one Moon and sighs, over the body of their latest kill, “I shouldn’t have put in that request.”</p><p>“Of course you had to put in that request,” Changmin drawls, ripping his chainmail off in irritation. He switches off the hologram enveloping his gunlance to give the disguise of a more period-appropriate longsword, and stretches. </p><p>Fuck but he hates the Dark Ages as a temporal period. All the clothing and protection they have to put on is <em> heavy </em> and people then were evidently still unfamiliar with the concept of a bath. “I saved your life then, didn’t I? You were all impressed and filled with soft lovely feelings of admiration for me. Just like how I just saved your life five minutes ago. <em> Now </em>will be a good time to show your admiration, again.”</p><p>“I was going to arrest him,” Yunho laments, when the armour on the newly dead would-be-suspect starts to sizzle.</p><p>Their target is -was- Class Hamphibius, who has a tendency to look humanoid enough if swaddled in enough layers. That was, apparently, sufficient reason for their target to flee through time to hunker down at such a dismal age on Old Earth, just to escape being caught for intergalactic trafficking. </p><p>“He had a huge-ass motherfucking giant very sharp sword coming down on your back,” Changmin informs him, trying to polish his own gunlance by wiping it on the corpse’s leather jerkins. He grimaces, as that smears the acidic blood and grime and other things around more, and carries on with his retort, “you wouldn’t have been able to dodge, much less <em> arrest </em>him.”</p><p>“The orders were to arrest him,” Yunho continues doggedly, iron helm tucked beneath one arm. “You came too close to shoot him. He could have turned around to gut <em> you</em>.” </p><p>He carries on with his bitching while Changmin tunes him out to scoop some blood into a sanitised vial, evidence for their after-action report once they’re back at Headquarters in their own time. </p><p>“Yunho,” he says, after he’s done and thrown down enough too-heavy armour pieces and cycles through his uniform bracelet, to settle for a less stifling undercover uniform of friar robes now that the danger is passed. “Be honest. Did you want me to just stand back and film you being stabbed and then drag both him <em> and </em>your corpse back to HQ while showcasing you both as Exhibit A and B, sorry for letting my partner expire on a routine assignment but no worries, here I have captured the entire process via hologram? I would save him but he said that is flouting orders, please have my apologies? By the way, I couldn’t stop him from bleeding out since Class Humanoids of Old were not fans of medicine and plain old hygiene?”</p><p>That stoppers Yunho’s words.</p><p>He ducks his head. They work on the clean up in silence, quicker now that the two of them are properly focused on things. </p><p>Yunho doesn’t protest when Changmin reaches over, to cycle his uniform choice to the more lightweight option of robes as well. Instead, he reaches into one of the inconspicuous packs strapped to his side, and goes, “here. We can use this since the assignment is now over.”</p><p>Changmin can’t do more than blink at Yunho slapping something really quickly on his wrist. He gets it then, when the feeling of coolness and cleanliness races in an arc over his skin. “So you still have your shower capsule? I would have thought you’ll use it after the bog hunt three Moons ago!”</p><p>“Had,” Yunho corrects, but he’s smiling at Changmin now, instead of looking like a kicked baby galactic hound rescued from the outer exo-planets. “I know you already used yours that Moon. I washed up manually in the stream, after that.”</p><p>“Oh,” Changmin says, and pats himself down to check he’s got everything (he has) and their gunlances are both strapped to their backs even with the uniform change (they are) and looks around to see if anyone is watching (the battlefield is deserted). “I’m, er, done. Thank you.”</p><p>Yunho doesn’t say anything else. He just steps close, a hand around Changmin’s arm in a comfortable grip, as Changmin programmes in the space-time coordinates for Headquarters into his holo-watch. </p><p>They bend their heads together, and brace themselves in their usual positions, as the portal activates.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you fic for Lia after she made such amazing art for #OA. We had a hilarious conversation during countdown to #ShimSolo<br/>Me: so you want zombie au or time-traveller's wife au or time-travelling au or vore demon au or folklore demon au<br/>Lia: /DIES OF CHOICE/</p><p>This is what she chose, so D-1 to TOHOSHINKI 15th DEBUT ANNIVERSARY OMEDETOU~<br/>There is no plot here. HAHA. More to come after I wrap up some of the existing fics.</p><p>Comments are, as always, love. x</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Case #62: daejoseonguk</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p> </p><p>“Jung,” Changmin hisses, staring at the abomination.</p><p>The abomination stares back.</p><p>He raises a hand slowly, and gropes around at his back. He had hopes, but alas. He hasn’t forgotten and put on a weight-offseter instead. </p><p>Changmin’s back is empty. His gunlance is, just as he remembered, back in their lodging quarters.</p><p>“Jung,” he repeats, at a louder voice, turning slightly.</p><p>The abomination takes a few tottering steps forward, so it comes into the courtyard proper. </p><p>Changmin turns back fast, to face it. </p><p>It backs up slightly to drip a splatter of drool on the ground.</p><p>“It’s really impolite of you to call me that, Changmin,” Yunho starts from behind him, traipsing out and still looking down at his uniform bracelet. </p><p>Doing so means he trips on the hem of his robes, both of them unused to such long hems and yards of fabric. But the maddening Class Humanoid rights himself just as smoothly with the next step. “Particularly considering the era we are in right now. Old Korea put a lot of importance on age-related hierarchy. Didn’t you read the briefing packet R&amp;D sent over?”</p><p>“For the last time,” Changmin enunciates, soft and vicious, “I read all the Briefings before we even meet for the actual bloody Briefing <em> and you know it</em>. If you want to be technical, this isn’t Old Korea. Now give me your gunlance.”</p><p>“Joseon, fine, Joseon, my bad,” Yunho mutters distractedly, still fiddling with his bracelet. “And you should call me hyung. Get yourself used to it.”</p><p>“Only if <em> you </em>call me hyung,” Changmin dares to reach out to where he thinks Yunho is standing, and pokes a finger into what feels like the other's arm. “Your gunlance. Now, Jung!”</p><p>“I don’t have my gunlance. It’s back in the jooga, why would I have it on me when it’s just the two of us-” Yunho looks up. “Oh.”</p><p>The abomination stares at them both. </p><p>“Now you’ve done it,” Changmin says. “It’s going to eat us.”</p><p>“No, but wait, is that a-” the idiot that he calls 'partner' takes a step forward.</p><p>“What are you doing? Come back!” Changmin yanks hard at his sleeve, and then at the collar of his robes.</p><p>Yunho doesn’t budge. Instead, his gat comes away in Changmin’s hands. The silk ribbons slip through Changmin's fingers in a flutter of black. </p><p>“<em>Yunho!</em>” Changmin whisper-shouts. </p><p>Yunho slides another step forward. The abomination drools.</p><p>“Stop moving,” Changmin thinks he is having a stroke. Or an aneurysm. Or both. “Just. Stay still. I’ll go grab my gunlance. Don’t move- don’t-”</p><p> “You’re a good boy, aren’t you,” Yunho says, and squats on his haunches. The abomination follows suit. </p><p>Yunho’s robes fan out about him, white silk and periwinkle blue rayon.</p><p>He holds out a hand, movement slow and deliberate. The abomination blinks, and leans forward equally slow to lick a long tongue over it.</p><p>“Poor boy, you look like you’re starving,” Yunho murmurs, and leans in to scratch at its jaw. </p><p>The abomination just sits there, looming over Yunho even when sat on <em> its </em>haunches, and lets its tongue roll out. “I know you hate me reminding you, Changmin, but R&amp;D did mention that this temporal period has wolves.”</p><p>“What the fuck,” Changmin says.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>What this temporal period doesn’t have is indoor plumbing. </p><p>Although they’ve got a well at the back. It's something Yunho points out, as he and the wolf make googly eyes at each other, while Changmin panics by the side that this is the assignment where he’ll have to go back to Headquarters with Yunho’s mangled corpse and a apologetic “I’m sorry it wasn’t me instead”.</p><p>Yunho scoffs, “I think it’s more likely you die ahead of me from alcohol poisoning during your gatherings while we are on leave.”</p><p>Changmin takes a deep breath. “Can you don’t harangue me about what you see as my depraved band of degenerates when your head is barely an inch from that thing’s jaws.”</p><p>Yunho just ignores him, and gives it scritches behind its ears instead, cooing, “who is the best boy?”</p><p>Changmin gives up.</p><p>With Yunho there, Changmin finally goes back into their quarters for their gunlances, as well as a satellite handset linking to Bigeast’s mainframe to her transporter body. </p><p>Yunho makes a face at the weapons, but stretches out grabby hands for Bigeast, instead.  </p><p>Changmin yanks it back and away from him, and paces deliberately towards the alleged wolf, half hoping to scare it off. </p><p>It just pants at him, all fours on the ground and tongue lolling and looking entirely too <em>big</em> and ugly. Its fur is matted and filthy and caked with mud and other things that Changmin doesn’t want to contemplate. </p><p>He presses his thumb to the screen, so his fingerprint activates Bigeast, and asks, “Requesting for visual identification of local temporal period organism.”</p><p>“Good Moon,” she responds, voice tinny and cheery. “Standing by for spatial scan.”</p><p>Changmin does so. </p><p>It takes barely a second before she hums, “Canis lupus, male, confirmed. Identified: extensive scarring and osseous fractures. A word of caution: specimen is severely below the healthy range of weight projected for this species. Proceed to vivisection pertaining to live log for R&amp;D purposes?”</p><p>“Of course not,” Yunho cuts in sharply. “At ease.”</p><p>“Very well,” Bigeast doesn’t argue. She can’t. “Powering down to standby mode.”</p><p>Yunho stands. He’s got his gunlance strapped on his back now, but it’s wrapped in a bow-and-arrows hologram. </p><p>Changmin looks at him from the corner of his eye. Then he looks at the abomination. “Are you heading somewhere? What about this thing, then?”</p><p>“Taepoong can’t eat our rations,” Yunho’s checking his ammunition case. “Look at him, he’s all skin and bones. He needs meat.”</p><p>“Taepo-” Changmin says, and spins so fast to Yunho that he thinks he gave himself whiplash. “You <em> named </em>it?”</p><p>It’s not like Yunho to deviate from the assignment at hand. Nowhere in the Briefing packet says they should feed a mangy, likely (what was that extinct species of ticks?) flea-infested, half-rotting cur.</p><p>“He’s not rotting,” Yunho refutes, when Changmin tells him that. “Look at him. He just needs a bath. And meat. Loads of it.” </p><p>“And,” he carries on, when Changmin just gapes at him. “Grey wolves are known to be excellent trackers. We can use his help to find that Class Apodemus embezzler.”</p><p>“So are galactic hounds,” Changmin retorts. “Yet we never put in a request for one of them to be tagged to us, because we don’t need them. <em> We </em> are good enough on our own, the two of us.”</p><p>Yunho just smiles at him. </p><p>Changmin knows that smile. It’s the smile Yunho wore, when they fucked up an entire space bandit army, with scant hope of survival back in their General Task Force days. It’s the smile Yunho wore, when they toppled an exoplanet resistance built on the breaking backs of Class Siren slaves with no other backup but the two of them. </p><p>It’s the smile Yunho wears whenever he makes the impossible possible. It’s the smile Yunho wears when he knows Changmin, having shed his idol-worship many orbits and assignments ago, will bitch for approximately ten seconds before throwing his hands up and throwing himself headlong into the fray to hit even harder faster stronger than Yunho.</p><p>He’s just never worn it with regards to a <em> pet</em>, before.</p><p>“Help me give him a bath,” Yunho cycles through his uniform bracelet, to settle on a linen and leather hunter get-up. “Look. He likes you.”</p><p>“Are you telling me to break my back hauling water from that primitive well for this thing,” Changmin asks incredulously. He looks down only to see the abomination lifting a leg languidly, and peeing on the wide split of his period-appropriate silk trousers. </p><p>“Fuck!” Changmin shrieks. </p><p>Yunho just walks out of the courtyard and through the gate, his laughter drifting behind him.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>In the end, Changmin gives the abomination a bath. </p><p>He can’t quite start on investigation prep or even walk out to get a feel of the land since Yunho’s off fuck-knows-where. And <em>it</em> was whining loudly at him and drooling everywhere and making a general nuisance of itself and following Changmin around when he went back to the jooga to flip through Briefing materials regarding the embezzling suspect and just... following Changmin everywhere. </p><p>And then it’s just whining as Changmin attacks it with water, and solar-sanitised hands. </p><p>Beneath all the dirt and grime and rot, it looks vaguely hound-like, except it’s a lot more hairy. And it won't stop shivering, great big ugly shakes that make its claws clatter against the flagstones.</p><p>Changmin retrieves his short electro-sabre, to try and hack some of that off.</p><p>Under the mounds of fur is a pair of black bright eyes. With most of the tangles and snarled bits removed, he can see the thing’s muzzle and its tongue at least now appears more pink rather than slavering and red.</p><p>He can feel the creature’s ribs, when he guides the electro-sabre along its flanks.</p><p>It trembles, drool splattering even more, and tries for a soft howl, mournful.</p><p>“You’re clean now,” Changmin tells it crossly, after he blasts it with their hand-held thermoheater, and shoves a bite of his protein rations into its slavering jaws, just to get it to stop whining. “Now go away and wait for the demented idiot who wants to feed you.”</p><p>It refuses. Instead, it comes too close to where Changmin’s seated on the floor at the numaru in an attempt to focus on his Briefing materials, and flops down on his toes.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>He’s trying to work out the possible routes the suspect can take, from their location here just outside Hanyang, when Yunho comes back, gunlance in hand and something huge and long and gangly strapped to his back.</p><p>Changmin’s toes have since gone numb from the weight of a wolf on them, albeit a starving, malnourished one. </p><p>“You’re back,” he says, looking up. The empty packs of his rations crinkle next to him. “I’ve worked out two possible routes we can investigate first. When we went to the inn earlier for our morning meal, the innkeeper did mention that a new tradesman has built a new estate in rece- <em>what</em> in Andromeda is <em>that</em>?”</p><p>The <em> other </em>thing is all legs and antlers. It falls with a limp thud, when Yunho heaves it up and over his back, to drop it on the stone ground of the courtyard in front of Taepoong.</p><p>Who scurries up and paces close in a circle around the carcass. His getting up means Changmin bends over his toes with a pained shout, because the blood and feeling are flowing back into his feet.</p><p>“It’s a stag,” Yunho rolls his eyes. “You’ll throw a fit but I just have to say again-”</p><p>“<em>Yes</em>, I have read the Briefing packet, and much more thoroughly than you since you’ve been off gallivanting and playing primeval huntsman,” Changmin snaps. “I was being rhetorical.” </p><p>Taepoong sniffs too long at the dead deer, and looks at Yunho. </p><p>A thump sounds, and two. </p><p>Taepoong’s tail, flat on the stones, swipes left slowly, and right.</p><p>“You like, boy?” Yunho’s beaming at him, a full-fledged grin wide across his face. It’s a rare occurrence. Changmin can count on both hands this particular grin has been aimed at <em> him</em>. </p><p>There’s an odd feeling in his belly that he suppresses in favour of saying, “does he even know what to do with that? I had to shove protein capsules down his throat.”</p><p>Taepoong wags his tail once more, and then lunges face-first at the stag’s ribs. The resulting flurry of blood and fur and gore splattering across the flagstones makes it clear even though it’s been a long time since he’s had a full meal, he<em> does </em>know what to do with his teeth and claws.</p><p>Changmin had felt hungry barely ten minutes earlier, and was about to suggest to Yunho that they make their way back to the inn for their supper. </p><p>The live demonstration of Old Earth's cyclical ecosystem happening in front of him means he’s not at all hungry now.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>“Ah, thank you for sharing that information with my, er,  hyung and I,” Changmin demurs, and tries to retrieve his hand. </p><p>The pawnshop owner leers, and tightens his grip on Changmin’s hand. Changmin coughs, “if I can- my, er, hyung is waiting for me.”</p><p>“I will treat you so much better than he does,” the pawnshop owner tries for a wink and a smile. The missing gap that would have housed his front teeth attracts Changmin’s attention more than anything else on his person.</p><p>Then he registers what the man has just said.</p><p>Changmin yanks harder for his own hand. “I think- you’ve got the wrong- idea- haha, gooooood sir, if you will be so kind-”</p><p>“He’s not your real hyung,” the pawnshop owner insists, and Changmin experiences a split-second of blind panic that all their work have gone to waste, and their covers are blown, and if killing a possible witness is considered collateral damage.</p><p>“You stare at each other too much for you to be, hmm,” the pawnshop owner says, and leers again. His thumb strokes across Changmin’s knuckles. “Your eyes are very pretty.”</p><p>Sheer surprise, more than anything, slackens Changmin’s jaw and Changmin’s grip. “What are you saying about hyung and I-”</p><p>“Changmin!” the erstwhile hyung says, looming over his shoulder. “Let’s go, we need to, haaaaa, visit the letter writer to send a letter back to Mother. Or have you forgotten?”</p><p>“Er, hyung! Right, yes, hello hyung, yes, hyung,” Changmin’s mouth says, while Changmin’s body still decides to remain on strike. </p><p>The pawnshop owner’s eyes dart from Changmin’s face, to just behind him. </p><p>Changmin doesn’t know what he sees, but the man blanches, face whitening. Then Yunho’s pulling Changmin’s hand away and he’s got Changmin’s hand in his and they are striding fast towards the entrance of the pawnshop. </p><p>His teal-and-white robes swish, hem overlapping with Yunho’s crimson-and-black ones.</p><p>Behind them, the owner yells, emboldened by the widening distance, “I’ll be here! If you ever get tired of your- hyung!”</p><p>Changmin just stares with very wide eyes, at Yunho’s profile, while they march out of the shop and back on the streets. His hand is maybe going numb with how tight Yunho is clutching it. </p><p>Yunho lets go of his hand. Changmin exhales.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>“Did that Neo-Classical humanoid-” Changmin asks.</p><p>“Yes,” Yunho says.</p><p>“Did he think I-” Changmin asks.</p><p>“<em>Yes</em>,” Yunho says.</p><p>“What,” Changmin says, inordinately offended. </p><p>“Yes,” Yunho repeats, rather patiently.</p><p>“But you,” Changmin flounders. He stabs a finger at Yunho. “Your face is like a girl’s!”</p><p>Yunho just blinks at him. His mouth is slightly open. “What are you even saying?”</p><p>“If anything,” Changmin reasons, infuriated, “I should be the- the- patron, because your face is totally more like a male gisaeng’s!”</p><p>“Whaaaaaat,” Yunho just keeps blinking at him.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>“Do you think I can go without my gat,” Yunho wonders, after they’re there for two orbits and it’s clear that the suspect in this assignment has some brains, to leave them chasing after crumbs in overlapping trails long gone cold. </p><p>It’s properly summer now, and they only have three shower capsules each so Changmin’s taken to pumping the well in the courtyard multiple times a Moon to bathe. </p><p>But the water’s all warm, so he never quite stops sweating. He takes to cycling through his uniform bracelet at least thrice a Moon, just so he doesn’t look like a wet rumpled mess from sunrise to sundown.</p><p>In contrast, Yunho secretes less bodily fluids. But even his face gets misted with a thin film of perspiration, whenever they come back to their lodgings after a long hard Moon’s worth of investigation and he gets to finally remove the old-fashioned hat and his outer robes.</p><p>“Doesn’t that say we’re immoral or sluts or something?” Changmin says, from where he’s flopped down on the numaru. He brightens. “Although! Maybe that’ll help open up a new avenue of questioning-”</p><p>“No, you’re right, we can’t, not with that pawnshop bloke still panting after you,” Yunho dismisses, sighing. </p><p>He holds onto the silk ribbons, his gat dangling from his hands. “Maybe we can go out in turns? I just know that Class Apodemus is <em> that </em>tradesman; the one with the new house you singled out. But he’s clearly hunkering down in his nest. We need to fish him out.”</p><p>“Or get in there, hyung,” Changmin says, only half-listening, since Taepoong’s trotting up to them, with his habitual tongue-loll. </p><p>Because it’s been two orbits, he’s filled out some. Now he looks less like something out of R&amp;D’s less ethical fusion experiments and more like the cloned wolves of Old that Changmin had, as a student before his Academy days, watched during his Neo-Classical Humanoids History classes. </p><p>For all of Yunho’s self-righteous rationalising in the beginning, they haven’t yet brought him along to track even a single trail or track. Instead he either lopes about the forests just next to their lodgings, or he comes to roll on the flagstones, content and gnawing on his latest kill. </p><p>They had discovered that he couldn’t hunt properly because of a gammy leg, and a paw that didn’t seem to work correctly.</p><p>Yunho had hesitated, a stickler for the Task Force’s rules of temporal interference. But Changmin had grumbled under his breath, and reached for his field surgical kit.</p><p>“Changminnie,” Yunho said, stars in his eyes.</p><p>“What?” Changmin looked down at Taepoong, only to flinch as Taepoong eyed him with a similar stare. “Jung. This is not interfering with the timestream. What is he going to do? Hunt a few more deer?”</p><p>“Get in there,” Yunho repeats now, when Changmin fends Taepoong off, complaining, “no, you big lug, go flop yourself over your owner there, <em> he </em>’s the one feeding you-”</p><p>“Get in there,” Yunho says again, with dawning glee. “You’re a genius, Changminnie.”</p><p>Changmin pulls his face away from under Taepoong’s giant paw before he dies an ignominious death from suffocation, and splutters. If Yunho’s grin is a rare occurrence, Yunho calling him ‘Changminnie’ is an even rarer occurrence. Which has just happened twice in an orbit. “M-me? What did I do?”</p><p>“Genius,” Yunho narrows his eyes, and marches off to where they’ve secreted Bigeast behind the house in a grove of magnolia trees, to patch in a request for additional resources from Logistics.</p><p>Changmin stares after him. “...Okay…” </p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>“This is not genius,” Changmin says flatly, after Yunho programmes their uniform bracelets to receive the software patch update R&amp;D sends over care of Logistics, and cycles Changmin’s to the fourth choice. “This is. Not. Genius.”</p><p>“It’s a good way to get in,” Yunho reasons. His lips are twitching.</p><p>“Why don’t we switch, then,” Changmin flicks irritably at the wide red silk ribbons gathered beneath his chin. His gat is huge and black and monstrous in size compared to Yunho’s.</p><p>“R&amp;D has their reasons for assigning the uniforms as such to us,” Yunho offers. He is, to Changmin’s fury, dressed handsomely enough in white and lavender -lavender!- silks, with his gat set jauntily upon his head and tied beneath his chin in lengths of black satin, coupled with a string of decorative blue-maroon beads extending low. </p><p>No matter. Changmin knows full and well who the R&amp;D department is headed by. That person is a dead Class Humanoid walking.</p><p>Yunho hasn’t forgotten, either, judging by the too-innocent look on his face. “Maybe you should drink less with him, if this is what he fantasizes you in.”</p><p>“Kyuhyun doesn’t fantasize me in anything,” Changmin bites out. “He knows I will flay him alive.”</p><p>“He can just grow his skin back with that new nanocell incubator he unveiled six orbits ago, no?” Yunho says, and chortles outright at the expression on Changmin’s face.</p><p>“Are you sure you don’t need heeled boots, Yunho-hyuuuuuung,” Changmin changes the subject and sniffs not without spite. He glares at the green-and-gold embroidery crawling over his own chest and arms. Beneath, the skirt of his hanbok flares, the same shade of vermillion as the silk ribbons under his chin and in his hair.</p><p>“I don’t know,” muses Yunho, “maybe my cover prefers taller women.”</p><p>“Fuck your cover,” Changmin says very pleasantly, and pauses when he hears what’s come out of his own mouth. “Wait.”</p><p>Yunho just flings his head back and laughs, white teeth gleaming.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>The upgraded uniforms do -surprisingly- get them into the estate where the Class Apodemus embezzler is hiding and embracing what looks more and more like his retirement plan, complete with dancing girls and boys and endless wine.</p><p>“This is my,” Yunho says as way of introduction, and finishes with, “Changsook.”</p><p>Giggling, the suspect sounds sotted and looks more than a little besotted. “What a lovely specimen!”</p><p>He’s got a more than credible cover, but still there are cracks. Up close, his nose twitches oddly every now and then, and he has a disconcerting habit of gnawing at his wine cup whilst conversing with Yunho.</p><p>Next to Yunho, Changmin just sits, shaping his lips into a smile painted crimson, and silently stews as they are being served wine and delicacies in an opulent sitting room.</p><p>When he’s made to pour the wine for both the suspect and Yunho, and groped twice, he treads heavily on the suspect’s fingers and apologises loudly and prettily enough that everyone’s distracted. </p><p>Over the suspect’s howls, he leans in close, to activate his holo-watch, strapped in safely under the wide sleeve of his hanbok, for a surface skin-DNA test.</p><p>“My deepest apologies,” Changmin gasps, and allows his hands to be stroked, while Bigeast murmurs in both the audio-chips embedded beneath his and Yunho’s skin at their ears, <em> positive identification: a match. Suspect locked. Transmitting information to the Operators department, </em> <em> Interspatial and Temporal Task Force</em><em>. Proceed? </em></p><p>“Proceed,” Yunho murmurs into his very full wine cup.</p><p>“What?” The suspect says.</p><p>“This, you lecherous pervert out of time,” Changmin says, and opens his mouth, to enable the sonic amplifier in his throat to do its job.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>In the aftermath, when Changmin quickly cycles his uniform to a more unassuming set of masculine, black-and-white robes before the audit officers arrive, and the suspect is woozy and bound in electro-chains and kicked unceremoniously to his side (“That’ll teach you to paw at me,” Changmin mutters) cursing them and twenty generations of their families, Yunho looks at Changmin. </p><p>“Good work,” he says, but it’s without the usual contradictory stoic joie-de-vivre colouring his voice.</p><p>Changmin knows what he’s thinking of. </p><p>“Hey,” he says, casually enough, when the Audit Unit pops in, their space-time portal snapping shut with a hiss. “Your team will need time to check through all the assets here, right?” </p><p>“Yes,” one of them says, bionic eyes already cataloguing the trio of silk paintings the suspect has got hung up in his sitting room. “We need to interview the detainee, as well.”</p><p>“Excellent,” Changmin claps his hands. “We’ll see you back at Headquarters, then. There was a need for deep cover, so we require a complete Moon to tie up the loose ends. Can’t have interference of the timestream, and all that. If the Heads ask, can you help relay that, please? We’ll be back soon enough.”</p><p>“Noted, Warrant Officer Max,” the audit officer says, and snaps a salute at him, which Changmin returns.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>“We can’t bring Taepoong back, Yunho,” Changmin tries cautiously. “It’s practically impossible to transport living biological organisms through space-time unless they’re like us, with our holo-watches tailored to our body mass, and.”</p><p>He pauses. </p><p>Yunho is silent, an unmoving mass save for his hand, still combing slowly through Taepoong’s fur. He’s sitting away from the firelight. Changmin can’t see his face.</p><p>Changmin dares to continue, after a while. ”You of all people know best Headquarters’ rules against muddying the timestream like that.”</p><p>They all sit like that for a little bit, until Taepoong grows bored and gets up on all fours, yawning and shaking his head.</p><p>“Go on, boy,” Yunho pats at his rump gently. “Get.”</p><p>To Changmin, he only says, “I know. Thank you for thinking first that he won’t survive the trip back. He’s not meant to, anyway. He belongs to the wild.”</p><p>It’s the first and only time they touch on this subject.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>Taepoong knows, somehow. He leans hard on Yunho, and licks him on his face, and keeps licking, and licking.</p><p>“Hyung. Is he trying to eat you at long last?” Changmin asks.</p><p>“Shut up, Changmin.” Yunho replies, face buried in Taepoong’s fur. His gunlance is strapped on his back and he’s already back in his uniform suit, while Changmin’s still in period-appropriate robes. “We’re trying to have a moment here.” </p><p>“Fine, Jung. Don’t scream for me when he bites your face off,” Changmin crosses his arms and leans against Bigeast’s entrance. </p><p>But he doesn’t interrupt again, not until Taepoong backs away from Yunho, and comes to stand heavily on Changmin’s toes.</p><p>“Ow,” Changmin says. </p><p>Taepoong sits on his haunches, and stares up at Changmin. </p><p>“I don’t have any more protein capsules for you,” Changmin tries. He twitches when Taepoong just opens his mouth to howl, long and deafening and definitely not eerie.</p><p>It’s a little eerie.</p><p>There is an answering howl in the distance. Then another. </p><p>“Are you summoning your fellow abominations to come eat us,” Changmin guesses, and yelps when Yunho ducks from around Taepoong, to clap a heavy hand on Changmin’s shoulder. Then his partner is squeezing past him and through  inside Bigeast’s interior.</p><p>“Wait, are you leaving already? But he’s still here,” Changmin says to the empty space beside him. He turns back around to see Taepoong backing away, tongue lolling out, and about three times the size he was two-and-a-half orbits ago. </p><p>“Portal activation in t minutes five seconds,” Bigeast murmurs. Taepoong throws his head back for another howl, and then sprints off into the dark of the night, a blur of grey. </p><p>Yunho’s back next to him. The portal activates.</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p><p>They’re allowed to put in their usual three Moons worth of after-assignment leave, after they’re back at Headquarters and properly debriefed and have their after-action reports handed in to the higher ups. </p><p>Instead of their usual wont, which is brisk goodbyes and then the prompt cessation of contact with each other till the three Moons are up and it’s time to work again, Changmin pauses. </p><p>Yunho looks at Changmin’s hand on his arm, and says in surprise, “What is it?”</p><p>Changmin fidgets. Then he takes the three filled vials he’s got in his side-pack and not included in his reports, and presses them into Yunho’s slack grip. “Here.”</p><p>“What are,” Yunho says, and falls silent, as he looks at the white nail bits in one vial, and the grey fur in another. The third vial is filled to the brim with blood.</p><p>“I swear he didn’t feel any of it,” Changmin hurries to clarify. “I extracted those from him one Moon, when he was napping under the Old Earth’s sun.”</p><p>Yunho just looks at the vials clutched in his fingers. His head is bent and Changmin can’t see the expression on his face.</p><p>“I guess, if you’ll rather I turn that in,” Changmin hedges, and bites back a yelp of surprise when Yunho grabs his other hand in a too-tight grip. </p><p>Their eyes meet. Yunho’s gaze are very bright. “Thank you.”</p><p> </p><p>--</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>All of you will probably want to kick me in the face but I'm happy that Shim has finally chopped off all the dead frizzy blond hair HAHAAAAA</p><p>Changsook-eonnie has her own eternal spot in my heart, across space and time. And--<br/>태풍아~ 보고싶다 TTTTTTTT</p><p>Comments are love. x</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
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